Seminar: Modern Power Devices

The seminar will be given by Prof. Florin Udrea and Dr. Giorgia Longobardi, University of Cambridge, UK, as part of the course on "Trends in Electronics."

  • Date: 10 April 2015 from 09:00 to 13:00

  • Event location: Aula Magna, School of Engineering and Architecture, viale Risorgimento 2, Bologna

Contact Name:

Contact Phone: +39 051 20 95404

Abstract

At the heart of any power electronics converter there are power devices which are the key components to increase the efficiency and reduce the foot print and cost of such converters. The first part of the course gives an introduction to modern power devices in silicon and wide bandgap materials. Devices such as MOSFETs, Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors (IGBTs) and thyristors are reviewed. The novel, groundbreaking, superjunction devices and technologies are covered in the second lecture. The final part covers the new trends in the field based on GaN and SiC technologies.

About the speakers

Prof. Florin Udrea is Professor of Semiconductor Engineering at Cambridge University with over 20 years' experience in power devices, smart technologies, micro-sensors, and MEMS. Prof. Florin Udrea is an inventor of over 70 patents. For his 'outstanding contribution to British Engineering' he has received the Silver Medal from the Royal Academy of Engineering for 2012. Since joining Cambridge University in 1992, he has worked on industrial projects with several major European, American and Japanese-based multinationals and has been a consultant to a number of design companies and semiconductor foundries. He is also a co-founder of CamSemi and Cambridge CMOS Sensors.

Dr. Giorgia Longobardi pioneered the work on GaN power devices in Cambridge more than 5 years ago. She has worked with several companies such as NXP and has spent considerable time during her PhD in industry. She has developed a new technique for characterisation of traps based on correlated measurements of transfer, C-V and transient current of GaN MISFET. Dr. Longobardi won a Follow-on-Fund from EPSRC (£60k from Jan ‘15 to Sept ‘15) to further develop the GaN device structures she proposed during her PhD. She has also been awarded a Junior Research Fellowship from Caius College in Cambridge for 4 years starting from Oct ‘15. Dr. Longobardi has given several talks and short courses on GaN power devices including in IEDM, and ESSDERC conferences and recently in Tsing Hua Science Foundation in Taiwan.